£19 for the phone, then £36 a month for 24 months. Calls, text and 1GB of data a month, plus BT OpenZone. Orange now allows Personal Hotspot on monthly plans.

Total cost is £883, but if we deduct £12 a month for a similar SIM-only deal on Giff Gaff (as mentioned) then the cost of the phone is £595. Buying it new costs £519, so I'd be paying £76 in "interest" over the 2 years.

Not sure if it's the best deal in the world but it's better than my other contract I had..basically I pay £41 a month with o2 and get unlimited texts, minutes and 2gb data and the phone was free got that through carphone warehouse and used quidco to get £50 cashback (which is now £80 cashback for the next 5 days!!)

Not sure if it's the best deal in the world but it's better than my other contract I had..basically I pay £41 a month with o2 and get unlimited texts, minutes and 2gb data and the phone was free got that through carphone warehouse and used quidco to get £50 cashback (which is now £80 cashback for the next 5 days!!)

Can you provide a link? Can't see the deal on their home page right now.

Not keen to give Carphone Warehouse any money (hate them) but a good deal is a good deal...

i'm usually doing 4-6gb a month, i've looked at some of the deals on there most are for 16gb phones, i want at least a 32, also am i right to assume cash is king? i can buy phone outright from apple, is that the cheapest in the long run?

i'm usually doing 4-6gb a month, i've looked at some of the deals on there most are for 16gb phones, i want at least a 32, also am i right to assume cash is king? i can buy phone outright from apple, is that the cheapest in the long run?

There's not a huge amount in it by my calculations.

For example, for a 32GB iPhone 5, the best deal I've found so far is £99 up front and £36 a month on Orange. Unlimited calls, texts, and 1GB of data.

(£36 * 24 months) + £99 phone cost = £963 in total

Ouch.

But I think I'm right in saying a Three SIM-only deal with unlimited data is £15.

So over the same 24 month period if you bought a 32GB iPhone 5 up front, you'll be paying:

and to the OP, i'm in the same boat coming off a 24m ip4 contract, i'm just gonna buy a 5 outright from apple and drop to a 12month one plan sim

If you are going to buy the phone outright I suggest Three's Ultimate Internet 200 for £12.90 a month and add the £5 per month tethering cost. This way you are saving money and also have the benefit of only having a 30 day contract. It does assume that you can get by with 200 minutes though, which is fine by me because it's all about the data.

Edit - Just realised you only get 1Gb of tethering data with this plan which probabaly wouldn't fulfill your needs

Don't 3 do an internet plan for £12.90 with tethering? Or at least tethering works, not sure if it's officially supported though.

Plus, you're only tied in for a month at a time.

"SIM plans with All-you-can-eat data do not allow tethering (except for the One Plan). If you would like to tether, you will need to choose a Pay Monthly plan and / or an Add-On that does allow tethering."

----------

if you want tethered and all you can eat its £25 minimum

so over 24 months thats.. £600 their ip5/16 deal with the same package is £963, so your paying £363 for the phone which is £529 from apple, ouch £176 more

"SIM plans with All-you-can-eat data do not allow tethering (except for the One Plan). If you would like to tether, you will need to choose a Pay Monthly plan and / or an Add-On that does allow tethering."

----------

if you want tethered and all you can eat its £25 minimum

so over 24 months thats.. £600 their ip5/16 deal with the same package is £963, so your paying £363 for the phone which is £529 from apple, ouch £176 more

Don't want get bogged down in morals etc, but my friend had the £15/month SIM only plan last year and it let him tether to his iPad.

"SIM plans with All-you-can-eat data do not allow tethering (except for the One Plan). If you would like to tether, you will need to choose a Pay Monthly plan and / or an Add-On that does allow tethering."[COLOR="#808080"]

I'm not sure you're correct here. For my iPad I got a Three SIM from eBay that has 3GB, or three months of use, and I could use Personal Hotspot (tethering). They cost around £10 and are technically PAYG -- I never registered any personal details with Three.

In fact when the Internet went down at my office this is what I used for several days to get my MacBook online.

As I said above, my research so far indicates most of the major companies allow you to use Personal Hotspot/tethering provided you're on monthly contracts. The exception appears to be companies that "piggy back", like Giff Gaff and maybe Tesco (?).

I just got a T-Mobile/EE SIM for my iPad, again from eBay, and again it's technically PAYG. Personal Hotspot is deactivated.

----------

Quote:

Originally Posted by MrMister111

do they how? how can I check? Can you go back months and months to check? I'd be interested in my usage, and how it compares to what my iPhone 5 says (I reset it at changeover date)

cheers

It's mentioned in your online bill (PDF). Typically for a sh**ty mobile phone company they only keep six months of bills online for you, but I regularly download them so have them going back for the two years of my contract.

----------

Quote:

Originally Posted by cambookpro

Don't want get bogged down in morals etc, but my friend had the £15/month SIM only plan last year and it let him tether to his iPad.

To be honest they keep tight control of these things. The whole 3G/4G network is built with this in mind. In other words they wouldn't let you tether if they didn't want to.

As mentioned I bought a PAYG T-Mobile/EE 12 month SIM for my iPad that allows unlimited browsing and 500MB of downloads each month. When I inserted it, the Personal Hotspot option disappeared. It felt very odd that somebody else has deactivated a feature of hardware that I own. It's a bit like putting petrol into your car and suddenly finding fifth gear has been deactivated.